House Speaker Nancy Pelosi became frustrated with a reporter who repeatedly asked her about Covid relief as she reminded him that ‘people are dying’ in Ukraine.
“It’s going to be your third time,” the California Democrat told NBC News and Punchbowl journalist Jake Sherman when he said he wanted to ask about Covid relief, which was left out of the 2022 budget bill.
“It’s intrinsic to love objective questions,” Sherman said.
“Yeah, people are dying in Ukraine and all that, you know,” Pelosi said. “People are dying from Covid, too,” Sherman responded.
Pelosi told reporters that she advised the Biden administration to ask for double what it was originally seeking — up to $45 billion for boosters and variants vaccines, treatments and tests.
“What I said to the management is, ‘You should ask for more,'” she said. We want it to be bipartisan, and we need to pay for it. So let’s go for a larger portion. “I think they should double what they asked for, because even when they were asking for something like $20 billion, it would only take us until June,” Pelosi said.
She again insisted that the cost of relief should be “compensated”.
“The last thing we need is another species,” Pelosi said. “I think the resources we had on the bill need to be consolidated now that we’re another week away and we still don’t have it.”
However, Pelosi said that most of her conversations with the White House over the past week have been about Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi got frustrated with a reporter who repeatedly asked her about COVID relief as she reminded him that ‘people are dying’ in Ukraine
The White House originally asked Congress to include $22.5 billion in funding to combat the ongoing pandemic, but that figure was dropped to $15.6 billion after negotiations between Republicans and Democrats.
The White House originally asked Congress to include $22.5 billion in funding to combat the ongoing pandemic, but that figure was dropped to $15.6 billion after negotiations between Republicans and Democrats.
Many Republicans still question whether any money was ever necessary, claiming there is money left over from previous Covid measures that has not yet been used. Then, a number of House Democrats — and governors — rejected a plan to reallocate the $7 billion in government Covid money left over from the US bailout.
Relief funding was eventually excluded from the budget, which was five months behind and before a deadline that would have led to a government shutdown. House Democrats are now working on a separate Covid relief bill, but they will need to garner 10 Republican votes in the Senate. If the mitigation was left in the budget bill, it retracted with the rest of the provisions through reconciliation and avoided the 60-vote hurdle.
Pelosi reportedly became angry Thursday morning with members of her party during a meeting of the Democratic whips over the funding exclusion, according to Politico.
Department of Health and Human Services. Xavier Becerra and Dr. Anthony Fauci came to Capitol Hill Thursday to stress the need for more COVID funding. After they spoke, Pelosi apologized to them for having to go down to the Capitol. Then he turned to its members. Want to tell me what you didn’t get? Don’t tell Noah about the flood!
As of Wednesday, there were 31,152 daily cases of Covid-19, down 43% from two weeks, and an average of 1,268 daily deaths, down 31%.
The White House issued a press release Tuesday warning that it will soon run out of monoclonal antibody treatments in late May and will not be able to offer a fourth, booster, diverse vaccine to all Americans unless Congress provides more funding.
There is currently only enough funding to offer the IV booster to Americans with compromised immunity.
The White House official told the governors Tuesday morning that it will cut the number of monoclonal antibody treatments being sent to states by 30 percent starting next week.
“It is likely that we will run out of these remedies for our most vulnerable … Americans by the end of the year, if not sooner,” the official said.
Moderate Republicans who can be persuaded to vote for more aid are still insisting on paying for it, and demanding a full accounting of where other aid money has gone so far. However, they blame the House’s progressives for ruining the chance to keep aid in the budget plan.
“Believe it or not, the administration has not provided the information that we Republicans have asked for,” said Sen. Mitt Romney, R-Utah, according to Politico. However, Chief Schumer has agreed with our leadership (on) a $15 billion package with money reused in previous Covid funds. It was stopped, you know, by the progressives in the House. But the money was there.
“We had a chance to have that last week, and the progressive wing of the House blew it,” said Sen. John Thune, R-R.P. They blew it up.
Sen. Richard Shelby, Ala., who is a Republican on the appropriations committee, said he is “open-minded about more aid,” but first called for an accounting of how the earlier money was used.
I’m not convinced of the need yet, but I don’t know for sure. So I’m open-minded about that,” Shelby said. “But I would like to see – having said this – we need real accounting for money.”
If the money is not hidden and the need is established, he said, Republicans can join.
